Our View: Next ‘Who’s the Boss?’ episode on tap for Rockford top cop Chet Epperson

Wednesday

Aug 13, 2014 at 12:01 AM

Rockford police Chief Chet Epperson’s attorney should forget the silliness and get to the real issues next Tuesday when he appears before Judge Eugene Doherty.

The hearing had been scheduled for today but was delayed a week because Epperson’s lawyer, Thomas McGuire, wanted more time to present his case.

McGuire contends that the Rockford Fire and Police Commission has no authority over Epperson and therefore can’t act on a complaint by Police Benevolent and Protective Association Unit 6 that the chief acted improperly Oct. 30 during a welfare check at the home of Lloyd Johnston, president of the NAACP’s Rockford chapter.

The union says Epperson undermined the authority of three officers on the scene. Epperson and Mayor Larry Morrissey say the chief did nothing wrong and point out that the situation was resolved peacefully and no one was hurt. That argument has much more merit than whether the commissioners are Epperson’s bosses.

McGuire should get to the point and stop wasting the court’s time and the taxpayers’ dime.

As Rockford Register Star Senior Editor Chuck Sweeny has documented in a couple of columns, the commission has a long history of appointing the city’s chief of police.

The state statute is clear: The commissioners are in charge unless there’s a local ordinance that supersedes the statute. There is no such ordinance.

An attempt to create one was defeated in 1943.

The court hearings are one more embarrassing episode in the long feud between Epperson and the police union. The proceedings do nothing to advance public safety or build the public’s confidence in the Police Department.

Tuesday’s proceedings will determine whether there will be a hearing Aug. 25 with the Fire and Police Commission. We expect there will be and that we’ll hear more substantial arguments from McGuire and Epperson then.